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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28660005">everybody's looking for something</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourteentimes/pseuds/fourteentimes'>fourteentimes</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Domestic Fluff, M/M, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Pining</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 03:56:07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,765</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28660005</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourteentimes/pseuds/fourteentimes</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Leo camps out--<i>colonizes</i>--the spare room. He comes, he tries to give Madara souvenirs, and he conveniently (or maybe genuinely, because he’s...well, Leo) forgets them as soon as he leaves. </p><p>Soon, his knick-knacks are decorating the window sills, the walls, the floor. They spill out into the living room, kitchen, even Madara’s bedroom. Carvings and figurines and fun notes he leaves scattered about because he seems to think all at once or not at all. </p><p>(or: Madara is a cursed wizard who gets a terrible crush and pines horribly for one (1) orange gremlin)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Mikejima Madara/Tsukinaga Leo</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>everybody's looking for something</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/comehomenezumi/gifts">comehomenezumi</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>hides my face in my hands i can't believe im so fucking awful that i'm actually giving you a christmas present on your birthday I HAVE MORE I WANT TO WRITE YOU JUST YOU WAIT but happy late christmas leo and v warm birthday wishes to u bc u are a JOY and i like talking to u i hope this is an acceptable gift *checks watch* two weeks late.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The air fills with a decided chill as the front door lock rattles and spins and lands Madara’s cottage square in the middle of what sounds like a blizzard.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mikejimama, I’m back!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span> Leo’s voice floats ahead of him. It’s a good day when he announces himself, yelling out a quick “here I am” while Madara has his back turned. It’s rare when he tells Madara that he’s back. More often than not, Madara will find him sprawled in the front room having barely taken off his shoes, already writing away because “inspiration struck, it’s here, it’s here” or stumbling around the morning after he gets in, bleary-eyed and time-blind and desperately in need of something to keep him awake so he can write more, so Madara never knows how long he’s been back for.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(He never says “home”, but that’s okay. Madara knows he’s not the kind of person you make a home in.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Leo-san, you’re early, yanno!” he calls from the kitchen. The last of the leafy green vegetables go into the hearty soup bubbling away on the stove. This big of a pot is impractical for soup if it were just Madara, but Leo always craves stew for days whenever he comes back from trips. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, they were really fast this time!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo blusters in, peacoat half hanging off his shoulders as he drops into his designated seat at the table. Any other chair, he says, ruins the connection he has with space and his inspiration, of course. His nose is still red from the snow country, and his cheeks have a healthy flush to them, and Madara wants--</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Well, never mind what he wants. That’s not very productive, is it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo doesn’t question why Madara always knows to set out two place settings. Never did, actually. Madara sort of wishes he would, just because he likes to see the wonder cross Leo’s face. He goes a mile a minute--faster, if Madara lets him--but in those moments, he stops. The slow dawning in his expression, the way his eyes light with amazement, the beatific smile that crosses his face when he understands--</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If Madara had less (or, rather, had even less) scruples, he’d kill to see Leo look like that every day if he had to. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They settle in for dinner instead. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s less satisfying for the dark thing in Madara’s chest that soaks up Leo’s attention like a cat in sunlight, but it’s fine. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s fine. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So, they just sent me back the way I came, can you believe it?” Leo’s story had started when he’d walked in probably. When he walked through the front door, maybe. Something about a poisonous rat infestation that Leo had to get his hands dirty to help with, maybe. Or was that the last kingdom? Madara nods along indulgently anyways. He’ll play their conversation back some other time. Rewinding his memories through his looking glass puts them through more wear and tear than they’re supposed to go through, but they’re a nice comfort on cold days when Leo’s out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(When he misses him.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No sense looking a gift horse in the mouth!” Madara says with all the brightness in his tone that Leo is used to as he sneaks an extra helping into Leo’s bowl before he finally sits down as well. “More time for you to go check out the next country on your list though, right? You’re really working through them all!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I gotta!” Leo says everything with such earnestness, it makes Madara want to wrap him up in armor every time he leaves. Extra magic for protection of course. He’ll sneak something into his pack before he leaves again. “If I don’t, then what if something happens to Ruka-tan? And then I never see her again?!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course, of course. Can’t have that happening!” Madara crooks a finger, and the map spread on the coffee table in the living room floats over easy, like on a spring breeze. “Where do you still have left?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hello~? Please don’t eat me~” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Madara doesn’t look up from the text he’s translating. The barrier connecting his cottage from its cradle to the--western shores, he thinks, shivers and parts around the stranger. Summer is always a good time for runaways and lost souls; the warmth makes even the snow country traversable, if only barely palatable. Plenty of people are moving about that getting lost in the crowd becomes even easier than normal. Three have already blown through this week. He snaps lazily to get the door to swing open and the kettle warming on the stove. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tea is always calming for waywards, somehow. It was all about wrapping their hands around something warm, a girl explained once. Since then, he always made sure to stay stocked. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The threshold to his cottage shudders as the newest wayward passes over it. Madara has his timing down to a science, stepping out of the kitchen with a nice, lukewarm mug in hand as his newest pet project steps in. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Huh, dragons are looking kind of different these days,” says his newest charge, a scruffy-looking orange--well, Madara’s not sure, but he also gave up trying to guess ages decades ago. The kid (they’re all practically kids to him) is older than most of the people who end up on his doorstep, though he’s not sure by how much. The orange one shifts his pack onto the ground. It frees up his hands for him to gesture. “My version was way better! You have a big uni-wing. It flaps from side to side to get you airborne.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That does sound </span>
  <em>
    <span>much</span>
  </em>
  <span> better,” Madara says lightly. The rules of the curse say that he only needs to pick up the lost souls. The kind that are running from something and don’t know where to go next and need a nudge in the right direction. They always have a haunted expression, but this kid is something else. There’s not a hint of malice or even apprehension in his big, green eyes. Just genuine, naked curiosity. He doesn’t look like he </span>
  <em>
    <span>has</span>
  </em>
  <span> a direction, but that seems to be by design. “Wanna sit down and tell me about it?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What? Oh, no thanks! You’re not a dragon, and you don’t look like you eat girls, so I need to keep going!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>They really </span>
  <em>
    <span>don’t</span>
  </em>
  <span> make them like this anymore. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Now, now! You came all this way, the last I can do is get you something to eat!” Madara slings an arm around the kid’s shoulders--</span>
  <em>
    <span>thin</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he notes--and steers them towards the couch “You came from out west, didn’t you? That’s far, sit, sit!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How’d you know?” The kid forgets his hesitation in an instant, and Madara should maybe be worried about that. The kid doesn’t seem like he’s wired to even be suspicious of people, let alone scared. “Wait, wait, don’t tell me, you have a magic bird, and it tells you secrets, and you feed it worms you dig out from your garden. But only the worms that are attacking your plants because if you don’t, then you’re going to lose all your worms, and then all your plants will die, and then you’ll die because you have no food.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then the kid’s arms fling out as he gets further into his tale about a “bird and worm war”, and Madara only just moves his tea mug in time to avoid it getting knocked over. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh, this is going to be </span>
  <em>
    <span>such</span>
  </em>
  <span> a long night. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Found a lead. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Good. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Of course this was good. Definitely good. Very good, even. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Also a place to stay.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Even better. From the dove the coos and trills as Madara scratches under its chin, he can guess where Leo’s found shelter for the night. It doesn’t exactly fill him with glee, but Wataru should be able to keep him safe from the worst of what Eichi has to offer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(And if not, Rei </span>
  <em>
    <span>does</span>
  </em>
  <span> owe him a favor.) </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Also don’t forget to feed the Little John.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Madara flips over the scrap of paper, but there are no more little notes from Leo. Not even a little musical doodle. He should be happy that Leo’s found somewhere to stay, that he doesn’t need to rely on Madara, even if it’s just for the night. He even remembered to write. That was responsible of him, for once. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>These are all things that should be making Madara happy, but casting a glance over his empty cottage-- </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Something closer to dread fills his stomach.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But the barriers around his cottage ripple as they always do, and Madara has to paste on his big smile and leaves Leo’s note on his desk, pinned carefully to the map he drew for Leo’s sake. Little John gets one of the treats Leo likes feeding her, and she happily flops over and refuses to move from the kitchen to go greet their guest. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>His work is never done. Now he just has a cat to (sort of) keep him company while he does it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The feeling lingers, and the weather storms outside his cottage in his little magical nexus. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It doesn’t let up until Leo walks through his front door a few days later, smelling like flowers and herbs and carrying a dove on his shoulder. A gift, from Wataru. For messages and the like.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So now Madara gets to do his job while he’s got a cat </span>
  <em>
    <span>and</span>
  </em>
  <span> a bird to take care of.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Madara does </span>
  <em>
    <span>not</span>
  </em>
  <span> think about how nice it is to have Leo taking up space in his spare room again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because if he does, he might grip Leo’s hand a little harder when he tells him to be careful, as always, and Leo cheerfully tells him that he’ll try, as always, and everything will just simply be as it always is.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And if he </span>
  <em>
    <span>really</span>
  </em>
  <span> thinks about it, Madara might even go through all the different potions he brewed once upon a time, back when he was another man in another time and much more cavalier about his methods for hanging onto things he really liked, and he’ll consider. Just for a moment. Consider what it might be like if he slipped Leo a few drops to forget. And then the walls of his bedroom will shake ominously and the curse wrapped around his heart will squeeze dangerously, and he’ll sigh as he sets the vials back on his shelf. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>How exhausting it is, trying to “do right by other people”. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s not unusual to have waywards come back. Some of them get turned around. Or they hit a bad patch. Or there’s just more Madara needs to do to help. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, usually they come with a purpose. They come asking for help or guidance or just somewhere to lay low for a bit while they get things together. Leo just shows up on his doorstep not even a week after Madara sent him on his way, and he’s just. Humming. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Leo-san, did you want to come in?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ah! Mikejimama!” Leo’s expression clears like the sun coming out of the clouds, and he smiles a big, toothy grin at Madara as he leads them inside. “I was looking for you, but then I got this brilliant idea, and I needed to write it down before I lost it!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you manage to get it all down?” Madara asks as he steers Leo to the couch. He’s laid out snacks this time. Leo hunts and pecks through them like a bird, holding each one up to the window to examine them as he talks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course! I’m a genius, after all!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What did you write this time, Leo-san?” Madara is still learning all the ways this kid ticks, but the surefire trick to get his eyes sparkling when he talks is to ask him about his music until he exhausts himself or Madara can find him something new to talk about instead.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“...and then I wrote this song for Ruka-tan, but...well, she’ll listen to it soon, and then she’s gonna be really impressed with her onii-chan!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ah, shit, Madara wasn’t paying attention. Now, Leo’s smile turns brittle, and he can’t just leave him like </span>
  <em>
    <span>this</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He looks like a good, strong wind will knock him over. Or else his feelings will. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sure she’s going to love it when she hears it. Let’s keep looking, all right? Where did you end up checking this time for her?” he asks. With a snap of his fingers, the map that’s pinned to the wall next to his desk flies over. The corners rip, but that’s nothing a little smoothing over with his fingers won’t fix. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he lays it out on the coffee table, the topography of the nations shift. The mountains are raised, and the basins lowered, and Madara studies it for a moment. Where had he sent Leo, again? Somewhere else along the coast, he thinks. So he places the cottage a little further inland, the windows rattling a little as it moves and settles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So we’re right here.” A small facsimile of the cottage, now wedged somewhere in the woods, springs up where he points. It glows a dark green, pulsing a little with the heartbeat of his curse. The rest of the map is dotted in his sigil, overlapping six-pointed stars that are spread across the countries. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo squints down at the map, studying it intently. “Has this map been magic this whole time?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s very magic! You’ve just gotta have the right touch,” Madara says, coaxing the mountains flat again with a stroke of his finger. “See?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are any of the dots Ruka?” Leo asks. He swipes a finger through one of the ghostly sigils. It falls apart in wisps of smoke before it comes back together again, bobbing happily somewhere in one of the larger cities in the north. “Is she here? What if she became a pirate? And she went there to sell all of her wares, but then her ship got stuck and now she has to get money to pay for the damages by working as a shop girl by day, thief by night, and--” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hold up there, not so fast,” Madara says. Leo needs some time to breathe, after all. “These are all people who I’ve already met. I’ve never met a girl named Ruka before.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So I’m on here, but not her.” Leo frowns, dragging a finger through all of the ghostly marks on the map. “That’s not very useful.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That all depends on what you’re using it for!” Madara picks up the tiny ghost cottage with his fingers, except in his hand, it doesn’t fade. A miniature of his little place in dark, translucent green, like a little jewel. When he places it up north along the river where Leo had pointed, the windows shake again. They’re a little angrier this time, as though to warn him away from abusing the magic of the curse, but he can’t help showing off. Just a little. Leo’s face is childlike in his delight as he rushes to look outside. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s really moved!” he shouts back, face pressed up against the glass. Madara doesn’t like the north much, where it’s rainy and cold if it’s not snowy and cold, but Leo has a huge grin on his face when he comes back to the couch again, so it’s fine. At least he doesn’t look so sad about his sister anymore. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yep! But we can’t move it again yet,” Madara says before Leo can even open his mouth to ask. “It’s got to rest. It gets ve~ery cranky if I make it move too often. Like a big cat, yanno?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What if you also had a real cat too?” Leo says. His face is almost comically serious. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hm~m, I’m not really sure where I’d get one, honestly!” Madara says. “Cats don’t really wander by my place. They don’t like it much!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Madara waves a hand. “Magic. They’re smart like that.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But you do good magic,” Leo insists, lifting the map over his head, “look at how cool this is!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can’t really leave to go find a cat,” Madara says as he pulls it gently out of his hands. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because they don’t like magic.” Leo nods along. “And not because you’re a dragon that eats people or cats or anything.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sure, let’s go with that,” Madara says. He can fill in the blanks with whatever Leo wants. As long as it keeps him happy, he supposes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo leans and leans until they’re shoulder to shoulder, his head resting comfortably on Madara’s. They’ve known each other for maybe hours, and this is their second meeting, and Leo doesn’t have a care in the world for who Madara might or might not be. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Have you thought about getting a public relations manager or something?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s cute. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(It’s slightly concerning.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Maybe Madara will keep a closer eye on him after all.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo’s not coming back. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That’s just business as usual, Madara tells himself. Kids come in, he finds them places to be, they leave. That’s the process. That’s how he fills his quota to be freed from this curse. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That’s how it goes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s supposed to mean a job well done. Time to move onto the next. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead, Madara is here, sitting on the couch (the one he looked into replacing at Leo’s insistence), with Little John curled up and purring contentedly on his lap, watching his sigil spin idly over one of the capital cities in the east. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He must have. Because Leo hasn’t come back, and Madara has very painstakingly counted the weeks, days, hours it’s been. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The years have been practically uncountable. It’s the work of the curse that has seared every single charge into his memory so he can never forget what he’s done. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But waiting, waiting, waiting. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Waiting for his sigil to blink out and for his service to Leo to end is the hardest thing he’s done. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>(If he did the right thing, a </span>
  <em>
    <span>good</span>
  </em>
  <span> thing, then why can’t he stand it?) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Leo?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ah, Mikejim--” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mama.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mikejimama?” Leo looks up at him like he’s grown a third head, and then, horribly, shrugs and </span>
  <em>
    <span>just keeps talking</span>
  </em>
  <span> before Madara gets the chance to correct him. “Did you know that octopuses have three hearts?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Having Leo around is baffling, disruptive, and, worst of all, completely endearing. “Mikejimama” is the one name that seems to stick with him, and Madara can’t make him stop, and then doesn’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>want</span>
  </em>
  <span> him to stop, because it’s. It’s cute. When Leo yells it because he’s happy that Madara made fluffy pancakes in the mornings or because he’s cleaning and needs help to reach something or just because he professes that he just is happy to see him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Madara hadn’t known what to say to the last one, but his quickly croaked out “happy to see you too, Leo!” seemed to have done the trick to getting Leo to smile at him, so. Maybe that’s a different feeling he has to reevaluate.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The magic of the nexus only allows one charge at a time into its space, and usually, that’s fine. Kids come and go, breezing in and out of his cottage as soon as they have what they need or Madara tells them what they need to hear or they just finally have some peace and quiet to think a little about what to do next. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Leo. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo camps out--</span>
  <em>
    <span>colonizes</span>
  </em>
  <span>--the spare room. He comes, he tries to give Madara souvenirs, and he conveniently (or maybe genuinely, because he’s...well, Leo) forgets them as soon as he leaves. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Soon, his knick-knacks are decorating the window sills, the walls, the floor. They spill out into the living room, kitchen, even Madara’s bedroom. Carvings and figurines and fun notes he leaves scattered about because he seems to think all at once or not at all. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The other part of the curse, though, says Madara has no power himself in forcing people </span>
  <em>
    <span>out</span>
  </em>
  <span> of his space. Which means Leo, dropping in at random and staying for hours on his couch, talking about how he thinks the entire eastern seaboard is populated by aliens before jumping up and running out the door because he realized he wanted to go find some. Or loafing in his kitchen for days because he needed inspiration to finish his masterpiece. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Or, on one memorable occasion when Madara had left the cottage connected to a little beachfront shop (definitely </span>
  <em>
    <span>not</span>
  </em>
  <span> because Leo had asked about the ocean), running in and out of the cottage at all hours to find Ruka, poking around every nook and cranny he could find. At night, they’d lay on the floor in Madara’s room with the ceiling enchanted to match the sky over the sea, and Leo would tell Madara his story of the stars, and Madara would fill in whatever gaps Leo wanted. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The knick-knack collection swelled in size when Leo finally departed, leaving enough seaglass to dot every single windowsill in Madara’s house. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And all Madara is left to do is admire the blue-purple-green light that filters across his floor, and think that Leo may not have been the worst charge he’s ever picked up. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They’re presents, Madara realises belatedly when he pages through a stack of Leo’s sheet music that he’d left behind one day. All with the words “no peeking until 5/16!!!!!!!!” in big letters across the top. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Presents for him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(Because he didn’t have a birthday, not one that he remembered, anyways, and Leo looked at him funny. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where’s a calendar, what’s your favorite date, then!” he said. Said, because Leo doesn’t ask, not exactly. He thinks, and sometimes those thoughts are for other people to pick up on and share with him.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>His heart’s warm when he tucks the pages away into a bookshelf and dutifully doesn’t look at them until Leo comes back, just in time to celebrate. (Actually, he’s a few days off, but Madara isn’t going to be the one to tell him and ruin his first birthday party in--since ever.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>(At least it isn’t his last.) </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re still here.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Anzu raises an eyebrow in surprise at him as he serves her a mug of tea. Little John, traitorous as always, flops over her feet and refuses to budge, even when Madara tries to offer him a treat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“As are you!” he says, boisterous and loud and not looking at the map that’s tacked on the wall just behind her head. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your time today, Anzu?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She sighs, just holding her mug in her hands for a bit while she glances around the cottage. Madara watches her, sipping his own coffee (yet another thing he adopted for Leo’s sake), as Anzu’s eyes catch on the details of Leo’s life that are left everywhere: the shells and seaglass; the cheery figures dotted between his plants; the papers--blank or drawn all over--left in piles and sticking out of books, everywhere and anywhere someone who moves faster than he thinks might need to reach; Little John herself, asleep on the floor. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’ve been busy,” she says politely, “decorating.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Like what you see? I can’t give you any of it, but I can tell you where I got it!” Madara says. His grip tightens on his mug (another gift) as he says it. He’s admitted something to her, and from the way Anzu nods along, she knows it too. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“All the same person?” Anzu reaches down to run a hand along Little John’s belly. “Even the cat?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Even the cat.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And you’re sure you don’t want to leave?” Anzu says, glancing at the map behind her. It’s a regular map now in almost all respects. All of the magic imbued with it dissipated as the curse worked its way out, until it was just a piece of paper, hanging on his wall, with one lonely pin stuck to it where his sigil used to be. “The way my mother spoke of you, I thought you’d be already long gone by now.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Funny how times change, isn’t it?” There’s no bitterness, no irony, no sarcasm to be found in his voice. A softness, maybe. “That’s life, though, right, Anzu? First your great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother, and now it’s you! You’re a lot nicer than everyone else, yanno?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I think I got lucky and you’ve gotten nicer, but sure, let’s go with that,” Anzu says with a sigh. “And your tea’s gotten better. Grandmother said she could hardly drink it the first time you made her a cup.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I was pretty bad then!” Madara says cheerfully. Anzu doesn’t need to know that it had been because he’d tried to poison her grandmother with a few more than healthy doses of nightshade. Water under the bridge. “I’ve gotten a lot better though, ri~ight? Everyone likes my tea now!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Even,” and Madara can feel the exact moment it feels like his heart drops out of his chest, when Anzu picks up one of the papers on the coffee table, “even Leo? Is this really all for him?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m not sure what you’re talking about.” Madara can do a lot of things, but he’s not allowed to lie to Anzu after the deal she made him when she was fifteen and smart as a whip (and because Madara might have almost wiggled his way out of the curse with some less than true statements). </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why you’re still staying here even though the curse broke a month ago,” Anzu says as she flips through the pages. “Wow, he’s written a lot, huh?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He has, he has.” Madara’s fingers itch to rip the pages out of her hands and put them back where they belong, on his coffee table where Little John could reach, if she weren’t so fat and lazy. “Very prolific! I think that’s one of his best works.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You liked him a lot,” she says softly. At least she has the decency to put it down, gently and exactly where she found it so Madara can feel like he can actually breathe again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Madara gives her a tight smile. “I like all my charges, Anzu.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He’ll come back,” Anzu says with the kind of finality witches save for facts and prophecies. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He doesn’t have to.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>No one does, after all. He helps, he says what he has to, and they leave. And that was fine, that was good. It was very good, exactly the way Madara liked it. He funneled people in and out of his home because it was his curse, his burden, his punishment for heinous things he’d done in a past life he’d managed to live to regret. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then Leo went and broke in through the monotony. And all he had to do was say Madara’s name like it meant something, and apparently that was all he needed. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He will.” Anzu reaches out, unwraps the fingers Madara has curled so tightly around the handle of his mug, and places it gently on the table for him. “You’re not an easy man to get along with. If he put up with you for this long, there must’ve been a reason.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Madara waits. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He waits and waits and waits until he can’t stand it, because sitting idle is the </span>
  <em>
    <span>worst</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Without the power of the curse, the nexus has only enough magic left in it to connect to a little storefront in the little country Leo left for, so Madara lets the cottage link one last time and steps foot out his front door for the first time into the back room of an empty, dusty old store.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He does like a good fixer-upper. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>---</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Two, three, four months go by in a flash as Madara fixes up his store, and then time keeps marching on after that, until it doesn’t anymore, one afternoon when it’s raining hard enough that every drop feels like thunder against the ground, and Madara is about to close the store early to retreat back to his cottage when there’s a sharp rap and bright orange head at the door. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mikejimama!” Madara almost can’t hear him over the beating of the rain and the beating of his heart as he fumbles with the door to let Leo barrel straight in and locks up behind him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re…” Madara swallows. The scruffy, overgrown orange kid that first walked into his cottage is gone, replaced by a Leo who’s not taller, exactly, but who knows how to carry himself more. There’s a confidence to his expression now, even when he’s dripping rainwater onto Madara’s floors. His hair is pulled back neatly into a little ponytail that settles at the nape of his neck, and he’s dressed in clothes finer than Madara’s seen in a long time. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He certainly </span>
  <em>
    <span>looks</span>
  </em>
  <span> like someone who’s outgrown needing Madara’s help. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Let me make you some coffee?” Madara says, mostly out of habit, partially because he must be getting cold now. With a wiggle of his fingers, a towel drops into his open palm that he passes to Leo, and they walk to the backroom and into the cottage sitting room in silence.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That alone has Madara pacing nervously in the kitchen while he waits for the water to boil. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d always imagined seeing Leo again to have a little more fanfare than a rainy night and making coffee alone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thanks for waiting!” Madara says as he comes back to that same old couch, where Leo has Little John already napping in his lap. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You kept my mug,” Leo says. The pleased little smile that crosses his face warms Madara’s chest for the fleeting second that it’s there before his expression grows somber again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you want a different one…?” He’s dealt with hundreds of moody children and teens, maybe a thousand, but for the first time, Madara feels like he’s at a loss with Leo.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No!” Leo yells when he seems to realise Madara is halfway out of his chair to go back to the kitchen to make more. “No, it’s fine, it’s not that! It’s not that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Something else, then.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My sister!” Leo says quickly. “I found her. Ruka-tan. Just as cute as I remembered, even though she was all grown up already, and she was really nice too, because she wasn’t even mad at me that I took so long to find her. Can you believe it? She even got married! Twice! Turns out she had two girlfriends the whole time, and they were looking out for her, and one of them is a princess, and now she’s a princess too, so I walked her down the aisle.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’d been wondering if that was the case, but I didn’t imagine she’d get married.” Madara gets comfortable on the couch. His coffee is warm in his hands, and Leo is rambling again, and things feel a little bit more right than they were before today. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Right?! Me neither!” Madara moves the mug out of the way just in time for Leo to throw his arms out. “Huge wedding, everybody came and everything, and it was--” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It was...?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo’s expression clouds, and oh, Madara is so far gone for him, because he just wants to take Leo’s face in his hands and tell him it’s okay, that he doesn’t have to talk about it, they can just do something more fun. Except this is Leo grown, who doesn’t need Madara taking care of him anymore, so Madara dutifully keeps his hands to himself. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It was fun,” Leo finishes lamely, sitting on his hands. “It was fun, but I don’t think I was happy?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That Ruka was getting married?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Leo makes a frustrated noise, and it’s really terrible how much Madara’s missed all of Leo’s weird noises he makes. He doesn’t know if he can feel any more fond of him than he does right now. “No, not that! I was super happy for her. Super duper happy for her. She was really happy, so I was really happy, but. Then she told me I didn’t look that happy? And that I needed to go!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s kind of cold of her,” Madara says quietly before he takes a sip. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You shouldn’t be mean to her, she was right! Because she’s always right. My Ruka-tan is su~uper smart like that, didn’t I tell you?” Leo’s nervous, Madara thinks. He doesn’t stop petting Little John, making quiet </span>
  <em>
    <span>mrrp</span>
  </em>
  <span> sounds from his lap. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But you still left,” Madara points out. “You’re here. Probably shouldn’t run around in the rain, by the way, Leo. You’ll catch a cold like that.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He does let himself have one little thing, brushing the wet hair back from Leo’s cheek and tucking it behind his ear. Leo’s a little cold still from the rain, but he also doesn’t make any move to </span>
  <em>
    <span>stop</span>
  </em>
  <span> Madara, looking up at him with his big green eyes that couldn’t sincerely hurt anyone. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“S-so anyway,” Leo flushes prettily too, Madara thinks as he pulls his hand away, “so she said I had to leave. Because I was just doing everything for her sake and it wasn’t. Good. Right? For me? That I spent all this time chasing after her and traveled all around the world and saw a bunch of things, and it was to find her, and then I did! And I still wasn’t that happy.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hm, still need my help, then?” There’s no curse making him say that, but if it’s for Leo, there doesn’t have to be. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sort of?” Leo still scrunches his nose the same way when he’s thinking. He’ll get wrinkles there someday, Madara thinks, and maybe. Maybe he’d really like to see that. “Sort of, but not like your usual thing. I just really wanted to come back to you and to Little John and your couch and like. Kiss a lot. Or a little. It doesn’t have to be a lot. It can definitely be as much as you want. Or don’t want. Or other stuff.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Leo.” Madara leans in slowly, slow enough that Leo could push him away, if he really wanted to, but he doesn’t, he doesn’t, he doesn’t.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You gonna tell me to shut up?” This close, Madara can count the freckles that dot Leo’s cheeks or the gold flecks in his eyes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not really.” Leo meets him halfway and crashes their mouths together. It’s inelegant, sloppy, but Leo tastes like sugar and milk and coffee and </span>
  <em>
    <span>home</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and Madara knows, knows, knows this is the only kiss he wants for the rest of his life.  </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>you can follow my writing twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/satiIIquinart">@satiIIquinart</a> for updates!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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